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Five takeaways on Kavanaugh and Ford’s testimony

Christine Blasey Ford and Brett Kavanaugh combined to provided one of the most dramatic and memorable hearings in Senate history on Thursday.

Millions watched on cable television as Blasey Ford held the Senate Judiciary Committee rapt with her account of a sexual assault on her as a teenager that she says was carried out by Kavanaugh.

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The Supreme Court nominee hours later offered an angry and indignant response, ripping Senate Democrats for their attacks on his character and denying Ford’s accusations.

Here are five takeaways.

Ford came off as credible

As Ford wrapped her testimony, both sides praised the 51-year-old professor for being credible and effective under hours of interrogation by senators and Rachel Mitchell, the lawyer hired to question her on behalf of Republicans.

Republicans hired a female outside counsel to question Ford and Kavanaugh as they tried to avoid the optics of 11 male senators questioning the 51-year-old professor, a setup that would have been compared to Anita Hill being questioned in 1991 by an all-male Judiciary Committee.

But the counsel, Rebecca Mitchell, failed to really poke holes in Ford’s testimony, and at times appeared to help her.

Fox News’s Chris Wallace said more than an hour into the hearing that Democrats were “scoring points” but Mitchell “hasn't laid a glove” on Ford. And Fox News legal analyst Andrew Napolitano on Fox News that Republicans “made a grave error,” by allowing Mitchell to “craft her questioning the way she did.”

It’s possible things would have gone worse without Mitchell, since that would have led to the scenes of the all-male GOP panelists questioning Ford.

Regardless, as Kavanaugh gained momentum through his own testimony, Mitchell disappeared from the hearing.

Starting with GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Republican members one-by-one asked Kavanaugh their own questions, a move that gave them the chance to also try to defend him.

Mitchell declined to answer questions after the hearing.

Grassley looks defensive

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grasley (R-Iowa) began the hearing on the defensive and remained that way throughout.

Grassley interjected and interrupted during both Ford and Kavanaugh's questioning, often sparring with Democratic senators over criticisms of his committee.

During his opening remarks, Grassley lamented how Democrats had treated the allegations from Ford, doubling down on his accusation that Feinstein “took no action” after receiving Ford’s letter alleging the Kavanaugh attack in July.

“We did not know about the ranking member’s secret evidence” during Kavanaugh's lengthy vetting process, he said.

He addressed the allegations from two other women publicly accusing Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, saying his staff had put in “eight requests” for evidence from Deborah Ramirez and “six requests” for evidence from Julie Swetnick.

Grassley spoke up throughout the hearing to staunchly defend the committee's actions, speaking over other senators when they posed criticisms of him or his staff.

He also went after Feinstein several times, including interrupting when she began her opening remarks by saying she wanted to introduce Ford because “the chairman chose not to do this.”

“By the way, I was going to introduce her, but if you want to introduce her I’ll be glad to have you do that,” he said. “But I want you to know I didn’t forget to do it because I would do that just as she was about to speak.”

Focus shifts again to undecideds

While the testimony from both witnesses could have an impact on the midterm elections and beyond, the immediate concern is whether Kavanaugh will get to 51 votes.

A handful of senators in both parties are undecided, and only they know whether their minds were changed by Thursday’s events.

Republicans hold a razor-thin 51-seat margin in the Senate, meaning they can only lose one GOP senator before they need help from Democrats for Kavanaugh to be confirmed.

“The question of whether or not is was him, there just isn’t the evidence to support that,” Thune said of Ford’s accusation against Kavanaugh. “The burden of proof had to be reached and I don’t think they reached that burden.”